BeckySharper brought my attention to a brief New York Times story about health disparities in aging gay, lesbian, and bisexual communities. The data are drawn from a sample of 1,052 self-identified gay, lesbian and bisexual Californians between the ages of 50 and 70 who responded to California Health Interview Surveys conducted in 2003, 2005 and 2007 and the research brief is available online (PDF). The summary from the brief itself reads:

Research on the health of lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) adults generally overlooks the chronic conditions that are the most common health concerns of older adults. This brief presents unique population-level data on aging LGB adults (ages 50-70) documenting that they have higher rates of several serious chronic physical and mental health conditions compared to similar heterosexual adults. Although access to care appears similar for aging LGB and heterosexual adults, aging LGB adults generally have higher levels of mental health services use and lesbian/bisexual women report greater delays in getting needed care. These data indicate a need for general health care and aging services to develop programs targeted to the specific needs of aging LGB adults, and for LGB-specific programs to increase attention to the chronic conditions that are common among all older adults.

I can’t say there is anything terribly startling about the data presented. The sample is relatively small, and from what I understand it was culled from a study that was not designed specifically to examine the needs of queer elders. The brief does not provide details concerning what questions were asked in the telephone survey and how the survey methods themselves might skew the information presented in one fashion or another. The data suggest more or less what could be predicted about the elderly in any marginalized population: that in many ways, they are more vulnerable than their non-marginalized peers when it comes to physical and mental health needs.

In several instances, I would have been curious to see the “GLB” data not only compared to the data for straight men and women, but also internally. It would have been particularly interesting to see some of the data broken down by gender, which was done with some but not all data. For example, the data show that gay, lesbian and bisexual study participants were overall more likely to be highly educated and less likely to be “low income” (living on an income below 200% of the federal poverty line) than their straight counterparts. However, given that women are much more likely than men to be low income in their elder years, I would be surprised if ageing lesbians diverge from their gay male counterparts in this particular statistic.

On the other hand, the study points out that lesbian elders are much more likely than their gay male counterparts to be living with others as they age, including a higher chance of being partnered (as do straight women when compared to straight men). The study offers no explanation for the gender differences here, but Becky points out that gay male elders are extremely likely to have lost a significant number of friends as well as one or more intimate partners to the AIDS epidemic.

On the other side, I would suggest that there are a number of possible cultural reasons why lesbian women might be less likely to live alone. Lesbian and bi women now between the ages of 50 and 70 came of age in an era during with many women who later found same-sex partners married men and had children prior to coming out (often through their involvement in the Women’s Movement of the late 1960s and 70s). My undergraduate research, studying a predominantly lesbian feminist organization that existed in West Michigan during the 1970s, brought me in contact with a number of women who currently identify as lesbian or bisexual but who were, during the 1960s and early 70s, married with small children. They often brought their children with them into same-sex relationships and continue to be involved parents and grandparents as they grow older. While I don’t know the statistics concerning gay men of the same generation, I would suspect that fewer gay men married, had children, or were the primary caregivers of children, during the 1970s. Therefore, lesbian women may be more likely to have biological family connections to support them in their elder years.

The other cultural phenomenon that I believe might contribute to elder lesbians well-being is the legacy of lesbian communities. While the culture of lesbian separatism has caused a substantial number of problems in the queer and feminist communities since the 70s, I’d argue that in this instance it may actually end up increasing queer women’s chances of having a community of people around them with whom to grow old. In fact, the New York Timesprofiled one such community back in 2009. At the time, one of my friends who lives on women-only land in Missouri wrote a guest post on my blog responding to the NYT piece and meditating on her own experience on womyn’s land.

Whatever your feeling about lesbian separatism and women-only land, or women-only communities, the fact is that intentional communities can provide enduring and stable relationship for folks who might otherwise be facing their elder years alone.

I actually think this brief is a reminder for us to fight against two tendencies in our society that are harmful for people of all ages and identities: 1) the social isolation of those not in “traditional” married-with-children relationships, and 2) the extreme age-based, ableist stratification of our culture, which hampers those in need of more care (children and the elderly, among other groups) by separating them out from those who are more self-sufficient. Moving forward, I would argue that the best way to ensure that the most vulnerable members of our society are getting the care they need is to consciously integrate them into mixed-age settings. As with childcare, we need to start thinking of eldercare as a social responsibility that all of us share, not a specialized professional vocation or the sole responsibility of those biologically related to the ageing folks in question.

8 Responses to “Queer & Aging: A New Health Study from CA”

Speaking as an out bi elder at age 63, my experience is my own but I would say that in general the bi or lesbian women I know personally have all actively sought out healing help for emotional/mental-health issues more consistently than the straight women I know. Bi/Lesbian women have been powerfully involved in the holistic/wholeness healthcare movement in particular in pushing for alternative care options. We are vastly more likely than straight women, in my experience, to claim our actual history as women healers and to incorporate that history actively into our daily lives and our creative/individual spirituality. And just as the Inquisition of old targeted and persecuted women/healers in vast witch hunts were were actual genocide, so the Big Pharma/Big-Profits USA health “system” has targeted us bi/lesbian women in particular. We are often given extremely negative mental-health “labels” e.g. oppositional disorders, due to our need to fight to survive. I have personal experience with this both as a chemical-health professional [retired] and as a past client. We bi/lesbian health professionals also get targeted as “trouble-makers” and our careers suffer financially and in terms of relative job insecurity, due to our need and tendency to fight for justice especially for at-risk clients by those straight or LGBTQ clients. We are particularly at risk of job troubles when we work with at-risk youth: we are stereotyped and demonized as predators and pedophiles, when in fact so many of us are the only safe health/care providers many at-risk kids & youth have ever known. We are often the empathizers who have “been there & done that,” as opposed to others who have more denial going on than we do. In total: we tend to be risk-takers by necessity, to be questioners of authority, and to pay a heavy price in life. Our elder years contain special wellness challenges due to our “battle scars” literal and figural. BUT OUR LIVES ARE OFTEN ‘RICHER’ SPIRITUALLY BECAUSE WE HAVE STOOD UP FOR LOVE AND JUSTICE.

@Alice, thanks for sharing! One positive aspect of bi/lesbian women’s eldercare (and possibly for bi/gay men as well?) is that we’ve already been prompted to think outside the box in terms of family formation and mental/physical health. Sometimes this can be a consequence (as you point out) of negative stereotyping that do take their own toll. But the result can often be that we have a much more independent, healthily skeptical view of mainstream solutions to eldercare and healthcare more generally. This could potentially give us a head start in problem-solving in our elder years, whereas folks who’ve been able to glide along on mainstream expectations could be caught short when those expectations/soutions fail.

@Anna & Alice: So true what both of you said. Because, of course, one of the great truths about eldercare is that in traditional patriarchial society, it always falls disproportionally upon women. Anything that changes that paradigm is a positive, whether it’s communal living, non-traditional families, or simply modelling caregiving without basing it on gender roles. In that sense, queer communities might have a lot to teach mainstream communities about eldercare.

I would also mention that when it comes to eldercare for women, the communal model that we see in womyn’s land is similar to the one that has worked for centuries for women religious. Studies of the health and well-being of women in single-sex religious communities—mostly Catholic nuns—have consistently shown that they live longer lives in better mental and physical health compared to elderly women in the general population. The peace and security of knowing you’ll be cared for by the younger women in the community must be a wonderful thing.

really interesting post! I especially like your last paragraph, and completely agree that care of older adults needs to be a bigger and more communal priority.

this reminds me of a recent class I had on TGBL older adults and the phenomenon of “re-closeting” when they need to access in-home care or go into long term care facilities (nursing homes). According to my professor and two clinicians, there is huge stigma in a lot of LTC facilities around being gay, and since the older adults in these homes are already vulnerable, they may be reluctant to be out. when you compound this with ageist attitudes around older adults and sexuality, you get a really terrible situation where people are unable to live their lives openly with their partners, restricting their meaningful activities and impacting their identities.

I’m not sure if there’s any research that goes into more detail on this issue, unfortunately, but even the idea of it points to the need for more supportive care for older adults.

I was aware of these disparities. There are so many barriers to care for so many marginalized groups and it breaks my heart. Thank you for also addressing issues with the research methodology for this study.

skara: when you compound this with ageist attitudes around older adults and sexuality, you get a really terrible situation where people are unable to live their lives openly

I’m so glad you brought this up, Skara! It’s always stunning to me the level of blindness among the population generally about elders being sexual, and needing the privacy to be sexual, in the same way as adults of younger ages do. Michele Hanson’s recent opinion piece in the Guardian comes to mind, wherein she attacked film stars Sigourney Weaver and Helen Mirren for being unabashedly sexual in recent films: “many women in their 60s may be thanking God that all that stuff is over, they need never be fagged with it again, and they certainly don’t want to be glaring at Sigourney, or anyone else, being ‘sexually active’ all over the big screen.”

I … what? It’s always amazing to me the number of people who feel it’s their right not to be offended by other people living their lives in public spaces. If you don’t like seeing women over sixty being sexual, then don’t watch the fucking movie! Also: I feel sorry for you, because I sure as hell don’t plan on stopping with the sexytimes — and I for one appreciate knowing that other people aren’t either.

So many salient comments. I am reminded that my maternal grandmother, a raging feminist and socialist/humanist way back when, had for 2 of her dearest friends a lesbian couple who were elderly and had lived together openly as a couple for many years. Because this couple lived in a rural area in Upstate New York they were able to have privacy; and their combined income was workable plus they were in an area perfect for gardening and keeping chickens & fishing/etc. Both women were well self/educated and loved reading – also my Gran’s passion. (My Gran owned the famous lesbian novel of her era, “The Well of Loneliness,” for example and it was passed down to me by my Mother after I’d come out as bi long after my Gran had passed away.) One of the women in the couple had the first name of Alice…. Both women were healthy and happy together; and other people who weren’t friends of theirs basically left them alone to live as “spinsters,” which was acceptable as a label then even though everyone in the area knew they were a lesbian couple. Today that kind of life is *not* considered acceptable at all; older women my age [63] aren’t supposed to have affectional/sexual feelings for one another that are passionate. Instead of being ‘poetic’ or ‘poignant’ or the like, such feelings in today’s virulent youth ‘culture’ [sic] are considered “GROSS!” Because nudity is only the province of models [most of whom are too thin and very unhealthy], or celebrity stars, these days it is “gross” even to visualize 2 loving, passionate older women undressed let alone nude and in bed together making love to one another. Unless one is into “weird porn” or similar nasty labels, and that is considered a hilariously gross online hobby not a lifestyle if it involves a person who’s into images involving the sex lives of older lesbians. So – have we elder LBTQ women made progress? Hmmm….